Midpoint review
Did we recommend a Midpoint Review in the Collaboration Cycle Request ticket? If so, follow the below guidelines to get started.
Owner
Governance Team
Timing
Request this touchpoint when you’ve finalized your design and have a prototype or mockup ready to put in front of users. Research activities may include interviews and usability testing, where users will complete tasks to ensure your product is functional and research results are valid.
Midpoint Reviews require a 2 day lead time
Note: This should be scheduled before you begin recruiting research participants and scheduling sessions.
Review formats
You may schedule a Midpoint Review in either of these formats:
Synchronous: Live, 30-minute Zoom meeting with Governance team, or
Asynchronous: No meeting is scheduled. Governance team members review your research and design artifacts on their own, and append their feedback to your request ticket
Note: If you choose an asynchronous review, but the Governance team decides your product requires a more in-depth consultation, we may change the review format to synchronous. If that happens, we will let you know ahead of time, in case you need more time to prepare
Objective
To confirm your prototype or mockup aligns with existing VA.gov patterns and standards and to ensure your product is ready for successful research activities. This may include usability testing, Veteran interviews, or anything else specified in your research plan.
We recommend a synchronous meeting if this is the first time you’re introducing Platform to your product and/or iteration. However, if you want an asynchronous review, we'll provide feedback on the artifacts you provide to ensure they align with VA.gov standards.
Moderator script
Each synchronous Midpoint Review meeting begins with the Governance team moderator reading the moderator script.
This script ensures that everyone participating in the meeting and everyone watching the recording after the meeting understands why the meeting takes place, how it will proceed, and how teams should expect to receive feedback from Platform.
Welcome to the Midpoint Review for _______ team for ______ initiative.
The Collaboration Cycle Midpoint Review aims for the Platform Governance team to review your product to ensure it meets design, IA, content, and accessibility VA.gov platform standards. If you are preparing for research with Veterans or VA.gov users, the Midpoint Review feedback will inform you if any glaring standards issues could negatively impact the results of your user research. We suggest you fix these before beginning your research with Veterans. We highly recommend addressing Midpoint Review feedback before the Collaboration Cycle Staging Review. Please note that by not addressing the "must" feedback, your team accepts the risk of potentially being blocked from launch to the VA.gov platform.
If the team completed a Design Intent:
Please take 5 minutes and communicate with us what has changed since the Design Intent, and let us know of any specific areas where you would like Governance team feedback.
If the team did not complete a Design Intent:
Since this is the first time we are seeing your product, please take 5-7 minutes to walk us through what you are presenting today.
Request
VFS Product Manager completes the Before Meeting/VFS Actions in the Midpoint Review section of their Collaboration Cycle Request ticket. All Collaboration Cycle Requests can be viewed on Collaboration Cycle Reviews ZenHub board.
Attendees
VFS participants (required):
Product manager
OCTO-DE Product lead
Designer(s)
Anyone else from your team who significantly contributed to the artifacts
The participants above will not be invited to the meeting by Platform. You are responsible for ensuring everyone required to be in attendance is invited. We encourage you to invite other members of your team as well, including:
Content, IA, and accessibility specialists
Other VA stakeholders
Platform participants:
Design
Accessibility
Content
IA
Product
OCTO-DE practice area leads
Artifacts
Note: VFS teams must provide all artifacts at least 2 days before the scheduled meeting/review. Please also ensure Collaboration Cycle reviewers have appropriate access to secured applications.
Provide links or documents for the following:
Finalized design prototype (desktop and mobile, with accessibility annotations)
Wireframes (with all possible user paths and error states)
Research plan
Conversation guide
Content artifacts
Link to any Sitewide CAIA feedback you received, including updates to static page entry points to your product (if applicable) or plain language modifications
IA artifacts
Link to any Sitewide CAIA feedback you received, including an IA review document or intake form
Outcome
Design, accessibility, content and IA Platform reviewers will document their feedback following the Must, Should, and Consider Framework, if applicable. Feedback tickets will be linked to the Collaboration Cycle Request ticket and available no later than EOD the next business day following the meeting.
Help and feedback
Get help from the Platform Support Team in Slack.
Submit a feature idea to the Platform.